In the field of television, and especially cable television, it is well known that programming includes a selected amount of time allotted for local programming known as local avails. It is also known that programming provided by a network may at times be pre-empted for local programming. Typically, for each advertisement that is to be inserted, a great amount of physical labor is involved.
In the field of television advertising, it is well known that the common method of distribution is a cumbersome and labor-intensive process. A hard copy of the commercial to be aired is typically distributed to each station which will be airing the commercial. The commercials gathered by a particular station must be cataloged, and stored. When a particular commercial is to be aired, it must be found in storage and retrieved. After the commercial has aired, the tape must then be refiled. The process used today is substantially performed manually.
Other devices have been produced for pre-empting network broadcasts with local advertisements or other local programming. Typical of the art is that device disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,814,883 issued to M. C. Perine, et al. on Mar. 21, 1989. However, the Perine device as disclosed is capable only of real time transmission of data. Further, each network to which data is to be transmitted must be provided with a separate computer, or slave, for transmitting that data. Perine does not disclose a device for transmitting the same data set to multiple locations simultaneously.
It is well known that the receipt of data transmitted via satellite is delayed from the time of transmission by at least a fraction of a second. Depending on the number of satellites required to transmit the data, the delay may be as long as several seconds. Therefore, it is difficult to transmit via satellite in real time. Due to the transmission delay, one or more of the receiving sites may not receive the transmitted data. If transmitting an advertisement to be aired in real time results in a faulty transmission, the broadcast of the advertisement will reflect the fault.
Therefore, it is an object of this invention to provide a means for generating an audio/visual segment, transmitting that segment to at least one receiving site, and storing that segment for future broadcast to at least one broadcasting network.
It is another object of the present invention to provide such a system wherein the audio/visual segment is converted to digital data prior to transmission thereof and converted back to audio/visual after successful transmission thereof.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a means for reducing the transmission time required for successful transmission of the selected audio/visual segment.
Still another object of the present invention is to provide a means for insuring the integrity of the data during the transmission of the same to a plurality of receiving sites.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a means for broadcasting a selected audio/visual segment to a selected plurality of broadcast networks simultaneously using a single hardware device.